Smuggler's Return
by lacthryn18
Summary: Meet Aeryn Da'Kar, she's cocky, arrogant with a Nar Shadaar size chip on her shoulder. All she wants is to get her ship back and disappear, so of course she's dragged kicking and screaming on a quest to save the Galaxy


_I've had this idea in my head for a while now, and decided to get at least the first part of it out and uploaded for people to read. I'm trying to go with longer chapters most likely will mover from cut scene to cut scence unless they are pathetically short. so may take some time to between updates._

_May the force be with you...enjoy ;)_

It wasn't the explosion that knocked out the engines on board the Endar Spire that brought her to consciousness, nor was it the shouts and screams from the crew on the decks above and below her quarters, no it was the blonde retard that she's been forced to share quarters with. Track…no Trace…Trask that was it, poking her with a blaster shouting her name over and over.

"Damn it Aeryn, wake up, the damn Sith have managed to board us and they're going to be here any minute you need to get the hell up!"

"Jeeze Track, keep your hair on, I'm awake."

"Finally! Get up and get dressed we need to make it to the bridge as quickly as possible."

He seemed to stop and stare at her for a moment waiting for something to happen, when she raised an eyebrow in question he huffed in annoyance.

"Are you going to get up or not?"

"Hey I'll get up as soon as you turn around."

"Are you…are you naked?"

"Well done laser brain, now if you'd turn around we might just make in time to the escape pods."

She watched with amusement as his pale skin turned a horrid shade of red before he turned around and gave her his back.

She was up and out of the bunk in a shot, grabbing the nearest clothing she could find, which consisted of skin tight Nerf hide pants, the plain white shirt she'd managed to spill juma juice down and the sleeveless jacket that had the unusual red seems under each arm. She was strapping on her blaster harness along with her stealth belt in no time flat, before giving Trace the okay to turn around while she grabbed her wicked vibrosword. It was his turn to eye her with amusement as he noticed the wicked looking blade.

"Don't you think you should stick to your blasters? We don't want a repeat of the training room do we?"

She was so very tempted to wipe the smirk off his face that she had to clench her fist around the sword handle to prevent her self.

"Don't you think that you should be opening the damn door before we die in a giant ball of flame?"

She spoke with forced sweetness injected into her voice causing him to wince. As he moved to the door she quickly finished her dressing by strapping on the wrist sheaths filled with needle point assassin knives she'd managed to get hold of on Nar Shaddaa she finished just as the door to their quarters opened. She spent an extra moment gathering up some of her personal items into her various pockets finishing just as Trance turned to look at her with a grin.

"Don't be getting too cocky kid, take a look down the corridor for any Sith"

No sooner then the word had left her mouth then, a volley of blaster fire pinged against the bulk head less then two feet from where Trace stood. He swore fluently in basic shooting her a glare before un-holstering his blaster and screamed for all he was worth.

"FOR THE REPUBLIC!"

Idiot, talk about suicidal tendencies, the chances of making it all the way to the escape pods now where slim to none. I stood back as the fool fired random shots at the Sith troopers at the end of the corridor, shaking my head in exasperation. I had my blaster in my hand and just stood waiting leaning against the bulkhead as Trace continued to fire, the way he was going he'd run out of ammo quicker then a Hutt runs through grub worms.

As predicted the red light on his blaster started to blink indicating the power pack was running low, at which point I decided to step in and save the poor sod from getting himself killed. In a swift sure motion I raised the blaster in my left hand and fired, three precise head shots taking the sith down instantly, just as the red light on the Tranks blaster turned orange indicating he was out. The poor twerp just turned to look at me as I strolled down the corridor towards him and continued on, grabbing what I could from the now dead sith and attaching what I was able to my belt.

"What the Hell was that? Why did you wait to fire?"

"Because nimrod, you seemed to be having so much fun."

"No wonder you ended up in the…"

"You finish that sentence and you're a dead man Truck."

"Its Trask, Trask Ulgo how many times do I have to tell you?"

"That depends on whether or not you can speak after death? Look kid, you need to learn that quantity doesn't equal quality k? What's the point of wasting an entire power pack on three, count them THREE Sith? You could have taken the time like I did to properly scope the situation before you started to randomly fire at nothing. You could have hit a conduit or force-forbid what if some of your own men happened to be stood in front of you. Get your act together or your going get us both killed and that doesn't sit well with me. Got it?"

He mumbled something incoherent before he decided to continue following me towards the next door.

"Look Aeryn, I happen to have looked at your record and your four years younger then I am, don't call me a kid."

I could only smile of course he was 26, according to the record I'd memorised when I'd hacked into the computer core my first week on board. So technically he was older then I was, but his experience was defiantly lacking compared to my own.

"An once again I state its quality not quantity that gets thing done. Now move your ass kid" I continued on, ignoring his hissie-fit as we made our way towards the next locked bulk head, I didn't even bother trying the control switch instead slicing directly into the door controls.

Seconds later it opened to reveal a Jedi facing off against a Dark Jedi the intricate movements of blue and red light as the separate lightsabers duelled against each other. Fed up over how long the battle was taking I raised my blaster and let loose with a sniper shot that hit the back of the Dark Jedi's head, sending him crashing to the deck. The Jedi looked at me with anything but welcome at her fight being curtailed. If she's been paying more attention to her surroundings instead of being irritated at me she might have noticed the Dark Jed's still active lightsaber slice into the electrical conduit behind her, she might even have managed to avoid the blast that claimed her life.

An instant later a group of three Sith rounded the corner ahead of us one throwing a frag grenade in there direction. I watched in slow motion as Trask's eyes grew wide before he dived towards the opened doorway to save himself. I stood silently and slid an assassin blade from the sheath and threw it, it hit the frag grenade mid-air sending the grenade back in the sith's direction. The blade fell to the floor with a ping seconds before the grenade exploded hurling all three into the air before they dropped to the deck and remained motionless.

"How the force did you do that?"

Trask was looking at me with a form of awe in his puppy-dog eyes and I couldn't suppress the groan of irritation. Instead I ignored him and made my way down the corridor, collecting the fallen Jedi's lightsaber and my blade along the way. In no time at all we had reached the bridge, the door had been locked down so I quickly slipped my blaster back into its holster and took hold of the vibrosword in my right hand, while my left worked quickly to slice the door open. It whooshed open with the customary clink alerting all the Sith that had made it to the bridge to our presence.

"Sithspit!"

I hissed out as three of the six invaders charged at us vibroblades and Sith broad swords swinging, while the remaining three took aim with blasters and carbines. I dived to the bulkhead taking Trask with me with his started 'oomph' echoing in my ears.

"Stay down! And give my some cover fire!" I hissed at him when the idiot attempted to stand up again and return fire. He glared at me for a minute before giving me a reluctant nod.

I poked my head around the bulkhead quickly taking in the positions of the enemy before I stood slowly keeping my back to the bulkhead and out of sight.

"Two blades on the left, one on the right. The blasters are in the back one centre behind the main console the other two either side of the display….you got that?"

I kept my voice low and waited for his nod and watched as he gulped in nervous anticipation.

"Focus your fire on the blasters; keep them down as long as you can….here-"

I handed him the holdout blaster from the back of my pants, and he took it with nervous sweaty palms.

"-Loose that and die Trick….on three…remember to stay low!"

I shifted my weight for my right leg to my left hefting my notched vibrosword in my right hand while I let three darts from my left wrist sheath slide to my finger tips, I shifted them slightly already lining the trajectories up in my head.

"One…Two…THREE!"

I dived across the door way my left hand splaying out releasing the darts out I noticed them hit and memorized their positions so I could retrieve when they had been dealt with. I tumbled across the deck ducking my head down as I rolled and the springing forward as soon as my left hand was underneath me. Distantly I could hear the sound of blaster bolts as they shot passed and ricocheted behind me.

The blade was switched from my right to my left in time for the cross swing as I took the first of the troopers down, with a quick change of grip on the hilt and a smooth backwards jab the second trooper ended up speared by my blade. I felt a hot blaze across the top of my ear as a blaster bolt narrowly missed my head, the heat caused my temper to flare and I flicked another dart at the offending shooter. I saw as it hit home through the face plate and sent him toppling to the deck.

There was a shift in air pressure as the last melee attacker swung at me, I managed to roll to the side narrowly missing the hit before kicking out the legs of my attacker, I sliced across him as he fell and lay there without moving. There where only two attackers left now and they both switched to melee as I dived across the open space to the nearest cover, I watched in amazement as Trask managed to take down the first with a clear blaster strike leaving the last to me to finish off.

When the remaining Sith lay on the floor twitching with the last throws of life I stood and quickly began to retrieve my darts from their targets, then stripped the bodied for anything useful cramming everything from frag grenades to med packs into the abandoned backpack near the door.

"That was amazing!! Why didn't you fight like that in the training room?"

Trask asked as he moved forward and checked the main computer, the Sith had been attempting to crack the central core and retrieve a full crew list and mission briefing when we had so rudely interrupted them.

"Because kid, the less people know the more chance you have of making it through life."

"Do you have to be so cynical not everyone is out to get you, you know."

"Just because I'm paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to get me. How about we quit with the chitchat and get out here before our friends here are missed?"

"Yeah sure I'm just deleting the hard-drive for the main computer; we don't want any of this info falling into enemy hands."  
"It wont be falling into anyone's hands once the ship blows up…and it is going to blow up that's why I suggest we get a move on."

"I'm just following protocol maybe if you did as well once in a while…"

"Stop right there short stuff, I've been out on my own in this universe since I was 11, so I'll let you in on a little secret. Like isn't run by rules, the good guys don't always end up on top and no one…and I do mean no one will watch your back as well as you can. It's a cold, harsh, messy universe you either live with it or you end up like them."

Tipping the blade in her hand to the dead bodies of the Sith laying on the ground

"I don't believe that, the Republic is all about working together for a common goal, it's your kind of attitude that supports the Sith-"

I didn't even think about moving, one second I was across the bridge waiting for him to finish, the next I was towering over him with my blade held at his throat, a tight grip on his throat, watching as he shook with terror.

"You know nothing!"

I hissed into his face across the blade.

"The Sith are monsters, petty anarchists more interested in lining their own pockets and protecting themselves. They feed on hate and death, slaughter and blood, you know nothing outside the pristine walls of the Republic which didn't lift a finger to prevent the Sith from decimating worlds. The Sith are an abomination that needs to be wiped from the face of the galaxy, just because I'm not stood here spouting off about the wonderful Republic and its whitewashed ideals doesn't make me like them in any way. Is. That. Understood. Ensign"

"Y-y-y-yes ma'am" he gasped out before slumping to the ground as I abruptly released him from my hold. I barely cast him another glance before making my way to the bulkhead door. I listened with a perverse sense of satisfaction as he struggled to gain his breath, blocking out his chocking cough as I started to hack the access for the door.

"Damn it!!" hitting the access panel in frustration, as I noted the lock down procedures had progressed to level 3. I began fishing in the pocket of my jacket for the computer jack I'd stashed their on my little after hours trip to the tech bay.

"Hey you stole that!" The whiny outcry sounded directly behind my ear. Turning I stood and stared him straight in the eye, the tiny pinch of sympathy and actual pity he'd been surviving on was quickly running out.

"Does it look like there is anyone around here, except you that gives a damn? Considering my sticky fingers just might save our lives you can either shut up and be thankful and I'm sure that I'll suffer the consequences later or you can keep annoying me and I might just save the Sith the effort of killing you. Oh and I'll take that back now."

I grabbed my holdout blaster from his nerveless grasp checking it quickly to make sure it wasn't damaged before flipping the safety and putting it back in its holster.

"Hey! You can't just blow something like this off, you need…"

"What I need laser brain is for you to shut up so I can concentrate on actually making it out of this overly dramatic intro into what is sure to be one of the worst days of my life. You want another blaster go find your own there are plenty just laying around." Waving my free hand towards the slowly cooling bodies on the deck I turned back to the door and started working the jack.

Another explosion rocked the ship sending me jolting forwards slamming against the heavy metal of the blast doors. My wrist screamed in pain as it connected but I managed to push it out. I was not going to die on this force forsaken ship. I was going to make it to the planet and I was going to beat the every loving crap out of whoever stole my ship before blasting clear of the ball of waste and straight for Nar Shadaa. There was a lovely little bar that had my name written all over it, that and an amazing Pazaak tournament that would set me up for a good few months.

"Sithspit! We need to get off this freaking ship I am not gonna be space dust." Muttering under my breath I managed to push the shooting pains in my wrist aside as I managed to input the last few combinations. There was a hiss and a shuddering groan as the seal on the bulkhead doors breached before coming to a shuddering stop.

"Now we're getting somewhere, move your ass kid looks like we're breaking out of this tin can." The grin was cocky and I knew it, force I was good. And I hadn't even been forced to use any of my real hacking skills.

"Can't you take anything seriously?"  
"Sure kid, I'll _seriously_ remember you have the sense of humour of a grub worm. Then again that being kinda disrespectful…to the grub" leaving him huffing in outrage, I began to wedge the doors further apart. Using my shoulder as leverage until the gap was wide enough to slip completely through. "Hurry it up kid before we're nothing but space dust."

Moving forward toward the next door leaving him to either move his ass or be left behind, I began to access the door mechanism, which luckily for us wasn't as heavily locked down as the bridge bulkhead had been. We weren't that far of the elevator that would take us down to the level we needed for the escape pods and I was adamant I was gonna make it before the ship was too far damaged to actually let it work. No way in hell was I taking some service shafts down over 12 levels.

Finally after what felt like an eternity of putting up with Trask's mumbling complaints about having to squeeze through the different door we reached the elevator shaft. It took precious minutes to rewire the access panel after what looked like a stray blaster shot had damaged it.

"Alright kid, today is our lucky day, gonna take a few for the lift to get hear but once it does we are almost home free." Throwing the irritating man a smile knowing that it would annoy him even further was the icing on the cake for me. I had to get my fun from somewhere, and since we were quickly approaching the point at which the ship would become a giant ball of flame he'd just have to live with being the only target for my sarcastic wit.

What ever the poor idiot was about to retort was cut short when the door to our immediate right opened with an audible hiss, before I even turned I knew I wasn't going to like what I would see. The frisson of cold dread hit the pit of my stomach as I turned to face the dark figure.

"Well, well, what do we have hear? Survivors? How quaint. I'm sure my Master will be more the pleased I dealt with you." His smirk was slow as he seeped malice into the very air. I knew that smirk, had seen it up close and personal on numerous occasions.

"Well looky here, little Bannon all big and strong, did daddy Malak finally let you out to play with the grown-ups?" I kept my voice sickeningly sweet matching his malice with contempt and only the slightest admiration. The little brat I had known as a child really had grown up, to become a psychotic killer yes, but that didn't stop me from admiring the view.

I knew I'd gotten to him with those remarks though, by the slight twitch at his eye, he could never hide his anger completely. It was one of the things that had always held him back. From the corner of my eye I noticed the horrified expression on Trask's face as I stood there conversing with the man intent on killing us both. Really I couldn't believe it myself either but I needed to buy us time or we'd be nothing but fried meet on a stick, or to be more precise a lightsaber.

"You! My master will reward me greatly for your death traitor." He hissed, so angry that spittle flew from his mouth.

"Look who your calling a traitor Banny Boy, pretty certain it's not me with the red lightsaber killing the republic soldiers you swore to protect."

With a roar he charged at me lighting his lightsaber and swinging at my head. I dived out of the way taking Trask with me, he hit the wall with a thud and lay there stunned while a rolled quickly to my feet and faced Bannon again.

"Oh come on! Have you learned nothing? It's been what ten years? Longer? An you still let your anger go to your head. Your impulsive Banny Boy, always have been always will be and it's what's gonna get you killed."

I had to duck again under his next strike, but managed to score a hit as I used my left leg to kick out at his knee. He hissed in pain and backed up a bit, reassessing me. Looks like Bannon had learned a little something in the ten years since I'd last seen him.

"You're going to die Da'kar just like your pathetic brother and the rest of your sorry race." He charged again, this time though his attacks were much more controlled and precise and I had a harder time dodging and countering his moves. I vaguely wondered where the hell the damn elevator was but pushed the thought from my mind as I was nearly decapitated by a powerful side swipe.

From the corner of my eye I spotted Trask as he managed to gain his feet, using the walls to support himself. He had a head injury, just great another thing for him to moan about. That thought was cut short as I cried out in pain as Bannon's lightsaber scored along thigh. I dived across the corridor from him and rolled to regain my feet.

"Not so glib now are you Da'kar? Where is your witty repertoire now?" his smirk was smug and arrogant, I wanted nothing more in the galaxy then to wipe that smirk off his face but had to focus to push the pain aside.

"Oh yeah I'm real impressed, what with your lightsaber and me with, no weapon. It's a real show of just how skilled you are in combat Ban. Why don't you join the real world and get a clue before you wind up with half a face like your precious Master?" I growled out through clenched teeth biting back the pain. A faint hiss sounded and I felt a wave of relief as the doors to the elevator slid open silently, and wanted to curse as I saw Trask begin to sidle along the wall towards them. I had to give the stupid gimp time to get inside it was the only way we were going to make it out of here.

"I'm sure Malak will be most impressed with your skill in beating an unarmed woman as well. He'll be falling all over himself to make you his top apprentice, though we both know how long will last don't we Ban. The second he gets hold of the Jedi poster child of repression he's going to replace you. Use your brain for once Ban and think, this whole thing, attacking us like, settling up this ambush it was for her and you know it. He wants her, he'll always want her and that means you'll never be anything but second best isn't that right huh?"

Finally Trask had made it to the elevator and was inside the door, he was watching me with blurry eyes but he was waiting. Why in the seven hells he was waiting I didn't know, I'd done nothing but pick on him and tease him since we met not sure I'd be doing the same in his position. It was a good thing he'd finally made it as well cause it looked like I'd succeeded in pissing Bannon right off. His bald head was blood red with rage he looked like he was ready to reach out and rip me apart.

With an almost deafening roar of pure rage he charged at me, I had a split second to think I'd just committed stupidest act of my entire life before I flung myself across the hall and through the open elevator doors. I slammed into the back wall harder then I expected, winding myself in the process.

Dazed I watched as Trask desperately tried to get the door to close.

I could only watch as Bannon turned and moved towards us a triumphant smirk on his face.

I could only sit as the world spun around me and Trask looked at me one last time with those puppy dog eyes before he stood and threw himself head first through the doors that had finally begun to close, but not in time to save us both from Bannon.

The last glimpse I saw of Trask, poor stupid idiot Trask. Was him barrelling into Bannon, pushing him back the blazing red glow of the lightsaber protruding through his back as he gave me enough time for the door to shut completely and the elevator to begin it's decent.

_Thanks for reading please review :) _


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